Confidence:
The confidence to make eye contact and strike up a conversation with strangers is absolutely essential.
Innate Friendliness:
Customers don’t want to deal with sales associates who have to force themselves to be pleasant and nice.
Flexibility:
When dealing with the public, things can go wrong. You have to be flexible enough to roll with the punches and think outside the box sometimes.
Ability To Multitask:
Sales associates have to juggle customers and their questions and needs, and at the same time attend to their other store duties.
Patience:
Dealing with people means that you will have to take the good with the bad. The patience to deal with all types of customers is vital.
Articulate:
Sales reps must be conversational and have the ability to formulate answers and provide information when asked.
Respectful:
The customer might not always be right, but she is always the customer. Customers must be treated with respect, even in the most challenging situations.
Proactive:
It’s never a good idea to wait until a customer is stressed or agitated before offering assistance. Being one step ahead to gauge when someone needs help is the best way to minimize a brewing situation.
Positivity:
The ability to smile in the face of a long and possibly chaotic day can make a world of difference to customers.
Empathy:
Being able to look at a situation through the eyes of a customer is an extremely valuable skill that can enable you to provide the highest degree of service. Undeniably, retail sales associates should go through a soft-skills training program. However, much of what is needed is attitudinal and should be hard-wired in those who are hired to deal with customers. Screening and qualifying new employees is of critical importance to a retailer. Yet, doesn’t it often seem that little or no thought goes into attitude during the hiring process? After all, sales associates are the front-line representatives of a store. At the end of the day, it’s all about how a sales associate interacts with a customer. How that interaction goes will ultimately determine if that customer will buy and recommend the store to her friends and family, or turn around and walk out, never to return again.Barbara